32
When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the
people gathered around Aaron, and said to him, “Come, make gods for us, who
shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the
land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” 2 Aaron said
to them, “Take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your
sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” 3 So all the people
took off the gold rings from their ears, and brought them to Aaron. 4 He
took the gold from them, formed it in a mold,﻿a﻿ and cast an image of a
calf; and they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of
the land of Egypt!” 5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before
it; and Aaron made proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a festival to the Lord.” 6 They rose early the
next day, and offered burnt offerings and brought sacrifices of well-being; and
the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to revel. [1]

So last
week we took a look at the Israelites having been set free from Egypt, and they
were out in the desert, trying to cross it to get to the promised land. They were led by a pillar of fire and a
pillar of cloud. They crossed through the Red Sea. They were provided for with
Manna from heaven to eat, and quail, and fresh water from a rock. All of that,
and yet they grumbled, and yet they doubted, and most importantly, and most
devastatingly they became afraid, and they cried out to return to Egypt. Let us
go back. . . why should we die in the desert when we were always fed in Egypt?
The old life wasn't so bad really was it? Of course not, let's go back to that
old way. How quickly it all turns. How quickly we demand results. How often we
do not have the stomach for the duration of the struggle. We can handle things
and keep it together in the short term, but life in the desert is long, nights
are long, and when times get hard, or when they get slow, and they slow down to
the tick, tick, tick. . . our minds wander and in our fear we create all kinds
of reasons to take a step back in fear and go back to the old way. But the
Israelites don't go back to Egypt. They talk about going. They plan to go. They
choose a new leader to take them back, but they don't go back. And often that
seems to be the case historically. We don't usually go back to the same chains.
Instead we create new ones. We bring a piece of the old way with us, and the
next thing you know we're not back in Egypt, but we've turned into Egypt
ourselves. History repeats itself, again and again and again.

For then
the Israelites build an idol. A golden calf of pure gold. A physical god made
in the image of the gods of Egypt, crafted by man for men, a man made god. Moses
goes up on the mountain. He's gone for a while, and the questions start again.
The grumbling starts again. The fear starts again, and the next thing you know they have forsaken God, the God I
am, the God who is, the God who made them, the God who was at the same time
making a new covenant with them based on law, the same God who raised up Moses
for them, led them out of Egypt, doing countless miracles along the way. That
God they decide to discard for a god of their own crafting, a god they made, a
god they shape, a god they form, a god they are in control of, a god they can
see and a god that gives the image of comfort, someone is doing something, and
that makes us feel good. We can say we tried, we acted, to quote Mel Brooks in
one of my favorite movies, we have to do something, people demand it our jobs
demand it, "we have to protect our phoney baloney jobs." We have to
do something, we just can't sit here and wait? Hey let's get Aaron to make us a
golden calf, we can be like those Egyptians, it worked for them didn't it, why
can't it work here?

You could
say, that's those Israelites, they had it different, Christians don't do the
same thing. Actually, sadly Christian history is very similar. After going
through the desert of the Roman persecutions. Years and years of martyrdom and
sacrifice. . . it all finally comes to an
end when Constantine, the Roman emperor becomes a Christian, but what
does that mean, to become a Christian. . . certainly in name, certainly the
symbols of the faith, certainly the vocabulary of the faith, but what about the
authenticity of the faith, what about the person of Jesus, what about the
character of God? One could certainly argue that during this period,
Christianity becomes a system, trading in the old persecution for a new
preferred status. Being a Christian becomes acceptable, and then the systems of
faith get formed, the how to do it, the how do you get to heaven? It may start
with a debate about faith and works, but it quickly devolves into money,
political favors, military service, forced thinking, huge structures of power,
Kings, dubbed and crowned by the church. . . connected systems of authority, using
the trappings of Christianity to rule, creating a system that conforms to the
will of the Kings, Nobles, Lords (you might say) Popes, Bishops, Cardinals, and
where is God in all of that? Where is God? God often becomes replaced by golden
calves of idolatry and power. Kings don't often wait to discern the will of
God, they just act, thinking who else will, who else can, even the with the
best of intentions it is all built on them on their shoulders. . . and God is
left on the mountain with Moses writing a different way of doing things.

But yeah,
we don't have kings any more, we have separation of church and state now. We
are growing closer to the authentic. We are getting to a place where we can
finally get it right. . . maybe, perhaps we live in a time when we are heading
out into the desert again. The question is what will become our idol? What will
become our golden calf? What will become our system for which we forsake it
all, hoping that it will bring us out of the desert all that much faster, at
least within our own hands, our own control, our own visible tangible pattern.
Because we have to do something right, we have to build something, we can't let
it die, this desert isn't going to get crossed by itself, who can wait to find
out the roadmap to building? We need to build now? We need to create now? We
need to see our salvation? Let's build something to save us. . . let's build a new system.

Last week
I introduced, T.S. Eliot's poem, "Choruses from the Rock" and gave
special attention to the line where he writes,

They
constantly try to escapeFrom the darkness outside and withinBy dreaming of systems so perfect that no one will
need to be good.

Dreaming of creating systems where
they become our solution, or salvation, our answer, and therefore our God. This
I think is what we do again and again in our world today. And it may be
connected, I think it is to our Old Testament story because what happens is so
similar. We get into the desert, we get into a hard spot, we get into a period
of doubt where we do not hear God's voice, either because he is not speaking to
us or we are not listening, or we don't like what is being said, and then
rather than waiting for it like Elijah, God's voice not being in the
Earthquake, or the fire, or the wind, rather than waiting for that still small
voice at the end, we assume that it isn't going to come, that God isn't going to
come and let us know our next move. Like the Israelites waiting for Moses and
God's instructions, we want to hear something now and we can't wait, we want to
do something now, we have to act, now. . . call it a crisis, and one of the
famous lines of the last bunch of years is, we must never let a crisis go to
waste, why, because in a crisis power is up for grabs, power is at the ready
because people want answers in a crisis, people want something done, so they
will allow people to do anything. . .
even build a golden calf, hey it worked in Egypt, why not here for us. .
. we're desperate we'll try anything. And rather than follow the truth, our
minds start to wander. . . and someone stands up and says, hey let's try this,
promising to produce results, and we think about the promised results rather
than how it's being built, what the foundation is, whether it is the will of
God, at least its something, even if it is just a Gold Plated copy of a
creature, a mere shadow of the God who is.

Think
about some of our systems in this world that we have created to solve problems
and make the world better. We have to ask ourselves constantly. . . have they
been built out of fear or out of love? That is a tough question, but I think an
important one, maybe the most important one. Have they been built with Jesus as
the cornerstone, or have they been built to stave off some disaster, according
to God's will or according to our own? Do these systems set people free or do
they work to enslave? Do they build people up to be able to fulfill who they
are, the greatness that God created, seeking to do good, or do they seek to
make people conform, allow people to be mediocre, allow people to not have to
be good any more, that the system will take care of their need for virtue, and
virtue, individuality, that divine image, isn't really a thing to worry
ourselves with. . . many of our political systems come to mind first off,
sometimes they are the easy ones. . . maybe a little too easy they can become
the scapegoats, easy targets for criticism because they are big. It's easy to
look at a system like welfare and find flaws, its easy to look at something
like Social Security, or Obamacare and find flaws, systems that no longer
require people to be good. . . Think
about Social Security, in theory, always theory in a system, people don't save money for retirement, so
let's create a system where everyone has to, now no one has to be responsible
and save for the future (again I know we still do, but that is the theory,
funny though to think we still do, how effective is the system?), people aren't
buying health insurance, or can't buy health insurance, so we'll make everyone
do it, no one will have to be good anymore. See these are easy, we could add
education, put kids in the process, socialism, let's systematize charity, outsourcing
our charitableness, so we no longer have to worry about helping people in need.
. . we can walk on the other side of the street while the man lies in a ditch
knowing that our tax money pays for services that are supposed to take care of
him. . . on and on,. . . and people pick on politics every day, it's an easy target, but in a democracy
politics reflect us, if not the way we would do things, perhaps shaped by our
apathy, but since it is a reflection of us, let's take a look closer to home.

Look at our
church. . . what do some of our systems do? Here we elect officers to be a part
of the Session, to run the committees, to help lead the work. This is an
interesting place, and pretty typical of a small church, because most of the
members here, most of you are elders. You've been through it before. You've
been to the meetings that last all day on Sunday afternoons. You've been
responsible for the lights being turned off, the doors to be locked, the
candles to be lit, the bills to be paid, the decisions to be made, you know how
hard it is to recruit help, to ask for help, it's so much easier just to do it
yourself, and so you do, and then after 3 or 6 years are up, you're done, you
need a break, and you stop. You may come back in a few years and do it all over
again, but the pattern repeats itself, the system works for us. . . but we ask
the question, does the system as it functions, allow us to not be good. . .
it's easier to do it all yourself, you fear that no one will help you, that if
you don't do it, it won't get done. . . or I've done my time, I'm not an elder anymore,
it's not my job. . . neither of those are representative of the best of
ourselves. . . but yet the system allows us, it makes it comfortable, and the
church is sustained. . . but what is it built on? What is the foundation? is it
faith? I wonder. . .

We are
going to have a Session Meeting this afternoon, we are going to talk about
budget items. We are going to talk about how we can create systems that will
sustain this church into the future. We are going to figure out ways to
conserve resources, allocate funds, always with an eye to the future, an eye to
rainy days, always to the question, how long can we leave these doors open,
keep this building going, keep this church going into the future with things
are as they are? We spend more than we take in. . . sure we have money saved,
but where is it going? How long can it last? How big should our nest egg be,
how big should our insurance policy be? How much should we save? How much
should we spend? Do we spend it on kids? On music? On technology? On social
programs? On the building? On the grounds? Where, Where so many questions? And
when will it all dry up? What if no one comes? What if we can't grow this
church? What if we can't replace ourselves? Is the clock ticking. . . tick. . .
tick. . . tick. . . . we can't wait any longer, we better do something now.

How easy
would it be to allow fear to be the thing that drives us? How easy would it be
to allow worry to drive us? Doubt? but we are called as Presbyterians as
elders, as officers of the church, as members of the church to rise above that
fear and build not of our own will but based on God's, our discernment of God's
will for us, for this place. And we have to be ready for the fact that God's
will may be very different from our own. It may involve the desert, forty
years, or it may involve sacrifice, exile, or even the cross and death, the
doors to close to be reborn some other way. . . it may be that. . . and how
hard that would be to let it go. Or it may be that this church is on the brink
of doing amazing things, a renaissance, a revival, a rebirth, a huge powerful
alive vibrant representation of the Gospel, of Easter, of new life, love and a
world made, redeemed, and sustained by God. . . not any one of us, but God
through all of us. Building and working according to his will. The rest is just
a show. . . anything else is just a golden calf.

Love is a
funny thing, especially when you look at it from God's perspective, especially
if you look at love on the basis that God is love. . . not that love is god,
not that our definition of love shapes God, that love become the idol of god,
but that God is what gives definition to love. Then love is the cross, pure and
complete sacrifice for others. Soul, Heart, Mind, Strength. . . all of you. ..
and the funny thing is it's never done. It's never enough and it is never too
much. It may challenge you, but it is never more than you can give, it's just all
that you can give, and it is forever. Easter shows us that too. . . there is no
rest for the loving. It gives and gives and gives, and it grows on the fact
that it keeps giving, and it is nourished in the love that it gives, self
sustaining in relationship. Not a system, but a relationship, flexible,
changing, always on time, because it is rooted in a God who is. . . not just a
God who was, not just a God who will be some time in the future, but rooted in
God who is and will always be. There is no better place to build than according
to God's will, on Jesus Christ, and no other place will ever suffice, it won't
sustain. . . all else hopeless, all other ground is simply sinking sand. . .
you may be able to build a bridge in the sand and it may slow the sink, you may
be able to keep struggling and struggling to keep your head above the surface,
you may be strong enough even to hold every one else up for a time, you may be
able to create some system to make it work, but it won't last, it will never
last, it can't last, unless its built, without it being firmly placed on the Rock,
and that solid rock is Jesus Christ, and no other.

Now I want
to say that I am glad that God put these words in my mouth today of all days because
I don’t believe there is a person in this world who needs to hear them now more
than I do, and for that I am exceptionally grateful. Amen.